Marilyn is a ray of sunshine, so funny. Not nasty-funny, sarcastic-funny, but little-girl funny, to make you feel good about the world.

Such fun we’ll have together, Daddy!

Don’t listen to the rumors, Daddy. Some people are saying—jealous people, nasty, ignorant people—that I have been auctioned here at Sotheby’s many times, that this is not the first time. Some people are claiming that fatal “accidents” happen to the wealthy collectors who have acquired me, sometimes within a few days—falls down flights of stairs that result in broken necks and severed vertebrae, cardiac arrest midway in vigorous intercourse, aneurysms, glioblastomas, untraceable “organic” poisons that cause the liver to disintegrate—but these are false rumors, and very silly rumors, pay not the slightest heed to them, Daddy.

I vow I will adore you—only you. I swear, there have been no men before you, Daddy. You are unique.

As I am lying in this inviting pose on the red velvet drapery with my perfect glowing Plastaepidermis and perfectly coiffed blond Plastahair, so I will lie at your feet. I will prostrate myself before you. I will be your beautiful bride. I will not—ever—murmur a word of sarcasm. I will not be impatient with you, though you are a foolish, doddering old man; I will be respectful of you, I will fawn over you as only a “fawn” can fawn—(we have learned our tricks young, fawns and girls, for we have learned to survive).

I vow, Daddy: I will never accuse you of not loving me. I will never accuse you of abandoning me. I will never accuse you of exploiting or betraying me. I will never accuse you of taking my money, hiding it in secret accounts. I will never collapse in hysterical tears crying and screaming at you that I loathe you—the very sight, the very touch, the smell of you.

I am not a madwoman. I do not cry “ugly” tears—when I cry, I am very fetching.

I am not a nasty woman. I do not want to be your equal. I will adore you.

I am not bitter. Bitter wouldn’t melt in my mouth.

Nobody wants a broody, teary Playboy centerfold. Can’t blame them! I wouldn’t, myself.

Could you guess, seeing me here so young, posing in the nude on sensuous folds of red velvet, so sweetly smiling, so unperturbed and unaccusing, that within a decade I would be the Sex Symbol of the Century, and a few years after that I would be dead …

You could guess? Yes?

But no, don’t think of that. Not yet—(you haven’t even brought me home. Our honeymoon has not even begun).

Though it is thrilling, isn’t it?—to think of that.